Question about Thalys trains

We're planning a trip to Germany that will include a train segment
from Cologne to Brussels. In studying the schedules, the Thalys
trains don't seem to stop at the Bruxelles Nord Br station, which
would be a short walk to our hotel, instead stopping only at
Bruxelles
Midi.

Are the non-Thalys trains that serve this route equally clean and
comfortable as the Thalys trains? The travel times are almost
identical. The EuropeRail site doesn't include a layout diagram of
the train (#14) that serves the Nord Br station.

cottonchipper wrote:

> We're planning a trip to Germany that will include a train segment
> from Cologne to Brussels. In studying the schedules, the Thalys
> trains don't seem to stop at the Bruxelles Nord Br station, which
> would be a short walk to our hotel, instead stopping only at
> Bruxelles
> Midi.

This actually isn't much of a problem. You can walk to just about
any non-Thalys platform showing a train that stops at Centrale and Nord
and transfer gratis to a train and get off at Bxl Nord. IIRC, the
destination on the ticket is usually "Bruxelles Agglomeration" or
something like that, so you're not restricted to getting out at Bxl
Midi.

> Are the non-Thalys trains that serve this route equally clean and
> comfortable as the Thalys trains?

If you mean the "InterCity (IC)" service, generally pretty much so.

On 31 Jul, 01:48, cottonchipper <cottonchip...@> wrote:
> We're planning a trip to Germany that will include a train segment
> from Cologne to Brussels.  In studying the schedules, the Thalys
> trains don't seem to stop at the Bruxelles Nord Br station, which
> would be a short walk to our hotel, instead stopping only at
> Bruxelles
> Midi.
>
> Are the non-Thalys trains that serve this route equally clean and
> comfortable as the Thalys trains?  The travel times are almost
> identical.  The EuropeRail site doesn't include a layout diagram of
> the train (#14) that serves the Nord Br station.

Hallo

Have recently needed to travel beyond Cologne from Brussels Midi.
Did this on an 'ordinary' ICE train because we had an Interail pass
and did not think it worth paying the Thalys supplement. These ICE
trains aren't as frequent as the Thalys but are of usual Deutsche Bahn
standard, so don't think you'll need have too many qualms if you ride
one of these. By the way, it was stated on the station departure board
that seat reservations on this ICE were compulsory, but no-one on the
train pursued this requirement - we didn't 'poach' anyone's reserved
seats, though !